Senate Street

Simply the greatest street in the world, strewed with IMBA students

Friday, August 10, 2007

Free 411

Google has come out with a free 411 service. Just dial 1-800-GOOG-411 (1-800-466-4411). Tell the computer your location and service you need. They will connect you for free to the number and text you the number if you wish.

If you can text from your phone, you can also use text messages to get information from Google. Type in a simple query like "mcdonalds 27703" and sent it to GOOGL (46645). Google will send you a message back with local matches. But please, don't limit your self....you can also check on flight status (text them "flight aa 2111")... current stock prices (text them "stock tgt")...or change from American to metric units (text them "1 us pint in liters"). For a complete list of services go to the Google SMS home page.

This service is still in the experimental phase, so use it while it is still free!

Thursday, August 09, 2007

Post MBA Salary

I won't go into any great detail, but I have made a spreadsheet with a guess of how much people will make after an MBA. Surprisingly, the two strongest factors I found are GMAT and pre-MBA salary.

To use:You have to have a Google Account....1. Click here. (opens a new window)2. On the right hand side click File->Copy Spreadsheet...3. Give it a name.4. Put your data in the grey areas.

This is purely a guess!

To calculate your post-MBA salary you can also use MBA360. I have no idea if they are trust worthy or not, but their number ended close to my in a few examples. Keep in mind they say "total package" meaning bonus and everything. My calculation is base salary. They also let you calculate your return on investment.

Wednesday, August 08, 2007

Facebook Song

Back five years ago I joined Friendster because I knew alot of people who used it. Now, nobody uses it. Completely useless, like scented toiletpaper.

My inbox is filling up with invites to Facebook, MySpace and LinkIn. I was hurt once and just don't want it to happen again.

With that said, I found this song by Rhett and Link some local North Carolina boys. This comedic duo grew up about 30 minutes south of my home town and graduated from North Carolina State University with engineering degrees. Go to their web site to see them crash Grammy's....

Thursday, July 26, 2007

Map of Top MBA Programs

The Moore School of Business jumped into the Wall Street Journal rankings this year at spot 49 nationally among regional schools. The Moore School had the honor to be #1 in international business among public universities. Click on the map to see a detailed list and map of the national and regional school that made the Journal's ranking.

Thursday, July 19, 2007

Sites and Sound of Buenos Aires

Buenos Aires

This last weekend, Brendan and I flew to Buenos Aires, Argentina for a four day weekend. The city flows with culture and an European attitude. Food and drinks are relatively cheap. My last night in BA I ate and drank $14 of beer and food. In the US this would have easily cost me $60. Inflation in Argentina over the last year was 14%. You can pay for nearly everything in US dollars and ATM give the option of pesos or dollars. While making the biggest government default in history does not help, I can't help to think that prices in Argentina are just normalizing to the rest of the world.

On a random side note: Globalisation at its best....finding the best priced airline ticket on an American travel site, on a Canadian airlines, while living in Chile to fly to Argentina.

The view from the Terrace on top of our hotel. We stayed at Gorriti 4290, a Bed and Breakfast in Buenos Aires. The B&B promised to be friendly, charming and affordable. It came through on all three. I highly recommend it!Just a random BA street...Another radmon shot...This is a chapel converted into a design center. It is in between the Hard Rock Cafe and the La Recoleta Cemetery.The grave of Evita in the La Recoleta Cemetery. I found it nearly impossible to stand in front it without humming "Don't cry for me Argentina..."La Recoleta Cemetery is a place where rich families put their dead. The strange thing is there are old coffins in the open air everywhere. I am not sure if this grave was vandalized or just fell apart, but there is nothing protecting the coffin.Dan infront of a modist grave at La Recoleta Cemetery.Does anybody else see it? its a scorpion with a gun...just look...BA has dogs everywhere. Dog walkers and dog parks everywhere too.I am guessing BA does not have any rules about cleaning up after pets. Walking through the city requires a hopscotch game with dog crap.Dan and Brendand with the owner of the Gorriti Hotel.I ate a $7 steak dinner here with the B&B , his wife and fellow hotel residence.Brendan in the hotel living room.The dinning area in the hotel.The B&B owner with Brendan and Dan.

Visit from Mom

My mom and stepfather, Larry, came down to visit me in Santiago about two weeks ago. We rented a car for three days and drove all over central Chile. The first day we drove out to Vina de Mar and Valparaiso. The next day we went to Maipú, south of Santiago. We drove on dirt road for 45 minutes until we reach a huge and deep puddle in the road. I was unwilling to risk my rental car deposit on it. The last day we hunted down wineries in between Santiago and Vina de Mar.The view from Mom and Larry's hotel room.Another Jump picture but this time in Maipú.More shoots from Maipú, Chile.George, Mom and Brendan enjoying the Chilean wine.The driveway coming into a winery between Santiago and Vina de Mar.Larry, Mom and I in front of the Cerro Santa Lucia (the Hill of Sant Lucy).

If you want to put the map into Google Maps, it is a bit harder.You also need a Google Docs account (which you have if you have gmail).

Do the steps above, but on step four download the KML file. Save this file to the desktop.

Open KML file with MS-Word. Go to the Replaice window (Edit->Replace…). Search for “^p” and replace with “”.In English, replace all the line returns with nothing. Click replace all. The ending document should be one long line.

Open a MS-Excel spreadsheet.Cut and paste the big long line created above into Cell A1. The entire line should be in A1 and no other.Save the spreadsheet on the desktop.

Go to Google Docs in your web browser.In the main menu, press Upload. Upload the spreadsheet you just created.

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

I’m an American!

"The name of American, which belongs to you in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of patriotism more than any appellation."

- George Washington, 1796

Americans get used to being called different things by different people. Europeans call us Yankees, much to the angst of the southerns. In Mexico, we are called Gringos.British call us Yanks and Austrians playfully call us Seppos.Nonetheless, we call ourselves Americans.

Some people in other North and South America countries take offense to this name. The believe the US has hijacked the name of the continent and that everybody in the Americas has a right to call themselves Americans.Just another case of US arrogance. In Spanish, we are called estadounidense that translates into United Stater.I am not a fan of the name.Some times we are also called norteamericano or North American. That seems like a bad name too since both Mexico and Canada are also in North America.

I think there are some strong arguments for calling ourselves Americans. First, we are the only country in the world to contain the word “America” in its name. No confusion there.Second, Mexico official name is Estados Unidos Mexicanos.So estadounidense could also refer to them.Third, what other country uses it political format for its nationality. A person from the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is British although we refer to the country as the UK.The “United States” is our political format, but American is our nationality.

Saturday, July 07, 2007

International MBA Internships

Click on the map to see more detail. Once on the Google Map page, click on each city to see how many student are currently there.

The Moore School's IMBA program is unique in several ways. First, it has a mandatory 16 week internship. Second, the majority of the internships are outside the US. The average student is over 3,800 miles from Columbia, SC.